Building an ideal client list is one thing, but arguably more important is knowing WHO from that target account are you going to track down... and how. This is how to define your ideal client.
Why is this important to know?
When you ramp up your marketing efforts using your target account list, you’ll reach out to all these companies through a variety of marketing efforts, but all this activity costs both effort and budget. So, to make the most of your time and money, narrow down your list to select your most likely prospects; those who will receive the full extent of targeted communications.
When we spoke about messaging in our previous blog, we talked about how we can convert a lot more customers by talking about the outcomes you can provide as opposed to the services you offer. Here, we're thinking about whether your outcomes match with the desires and pain points being experienced by your list.
Who among your list could benefit the most from your solution?
Hint: you already have the answer
To make this determination, you’ll need to go back to your ideal customer profile. These can be generated by extrapolating from your best existing customers, while imagining how your current best customers could be even better. Now it’s time to understand how your ideal customer persona overlaps with your list of real-world targets.
At this point, you will have accumulated a large corpus of information about your most potentially valuable customers and their employees. In order to contact these individuals in a systemic manner—you’re going to need a list.
Creating a list can be as simple as writing names, phone numbers, and email addresses down on paper, or adding them to a spreadsheet. In the SalesPlay On-Ramp™ Program, we work you through our Top 10 Customers worksheet to get you started. Where you choose to hold this information into the future is up to you.
We recommend a tool like LinkedIn Sales Navigator to generate your list of names. Why? It automatically recommends leads, allows you to segment accounts, and gives you access to contacts via its InMail. You’re also able to add colleagues to your team so you’re all on top of who you’re targeting, what communications your team has had with them to date, and where they sit in the funnel - all in one place.
Although there are tools that can recommend leads for you, you’ll achieve the best results if you can supplement these machine-powered recommendations with your own insights. Key here will be the ability to match your buyer personae to the leads being presented. If you can find a company with the obvious pain points you’re looking for and a number of contacts that match the customer profile you’ve put together, that organization should go on top of your list.
Remember…
Since you’ve made it this far you might be interested to know more about our SalesPlay On-Ramp™ Program? If we're right, shoot us an email and we'll send through all the details.